


Immortality

by faeblesmith



Category: Original Work
Genre: Explicit Abuse, F/M, Gay, Homophobia, M/M, and it gets really dark really fast, but it's, it's really dark, like sunset in december
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-08
Updated: 2018-10-08
Packaged: 2019-07-28 00:27:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,431
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16230413
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/faeblesmith/pseuds/faeblesmith
Summary: Mark Alderon was never able to tell Jimmy to leave Andy Greenwood alone, and that comes back to bite him when Andy is assigned to be his partner in a major history assignment. Andy is nothing like he expected; he's kind, and soft-spoken, and sweeter than honey, and everything Mark has ever wanted. If only life were quite that simple."Oh, how wrong we were to think that immortality meant never dying..." Our Lady of Sorrows, My Chemical Romance





	1. Chapter 1

Mark had overslept. Most likely it was his fault   -in fact, it certainly was- but through his hungover daze, he decided that it was the fact that his parents went out of town and so his mother wasn’t there to yell at him at fault. The soft sunlight bathing him from behind his curtains made his head pound, his ears began to ring. His room felt too warm, and his body was sticky from night sweats. A soft swear slipped from between his lips and he sat up. The whole room looped and swirled before him; maybe he was still drunk, he had had quite a lot. He carefully gets up, letting out another curse as he makes his way to the bathroom. The cold tile gives a sharp shock to his overly warm body. As he normally does, Mark looks in the mirror. The face he sees made him want to scream bloody murder. 

“My hair…” he whispers, touching the spiked monstrosity. His hair was really the only thought in his mind. The hair that he took so pride in, put so much time into, was a spiked, sweaty, stuck mess; some of it was poking out at odd, crimped angles, other bits stuck to his forehead and the back of his neck. This sight alone was almost enough to send him back to bed without even trying. But, since that didn’t send him back, the piercing bathroom light that Mark belatedly turns on posed a new challenge. After five painful minutes, Mark gives up entirely and finishes getting ready. The pounding headache and swirling vision would again prove to be an issue as Mark slowly makes his way to his car, the cool September air chilling him and the bright late morning sun blinding him. Up to that point, things had been difficult, painful, tedious, but doable. This felt like hell, like he’d died the night before and awoke in his own personal hell: driving to school with a hangover. Which, of course, meant dealing with school with a hangover. 

The streets were surprisingly busy on his way to St. Nathaniel’s High, and this morning’s commute felt so much longer than every other. It was a journey that would have had even Odysseus’ pity. He pulls into the parking lot of the old cathedral, and stares at the melancholic bricks for a very long time, debating whether or not he really wants to walk in. Eventually, he brings himself to turn off the car and get out, albeit reluctantly. The school that Mark now slowly made his way into had once been a Catholic church, back when Catholicism was most common in New Northumbria. Sometime before Mark, or even his parents, was born, a sort of mini-reformation happened,  and St. Nathaniel’s was converted into the main high school for New Northumbria. Since then, it’s been expanded, and improved, and renovated, turned into a proper school; the chapel itself was just the main office now, a main office with shoddy temporary walls and stained glass windows, but a main office nonetheless. 

Upon entering, Mark is greeted by perpetually peppy Mrs. Carver (Carson? Carlisle? Something beginning in ‘C’), who gasps upon seeing him. It was probably the hair. 

“Mark Alderon! You’re late!” she exclaims, the stern look expression on her face making her look goofy. “You know your mother will hear about this.” It was neither warning nor threat, simply a statement of fact. With a forced smile, and a futile attempt to hide the pain, Mark replies,

“She probably already has, Mrs. C. Can I have a pass?” Mrs. Carson nods, clacking away at the ancient computer in front of her. She informs him that second period is about half over, and bids him good day as he exits the musty building. It occurred to Mark, as he walked to his locker, that he not only did not have his phone with him, but hadn’t informed any of his friends that he was alive. He wondered what rumors they’d already begun to circulate about him. Nothing good, probably. The echo of his locker closing had Mark’s ears ringing again, as though someone had put an underwater effect onto the world. 

All eyes are on Mark when he enters the classroom, and all eyes stay on him as he makes his way slowly to his seat. One pair of eyes in particular truly bother him, the same way they always bother him. Pale green, like a late frost over an unlucky baby leaf, the eyes of Andrew Greenwood always made his skin crawl. It was not always an unpleasant feeling.  While his luck was thin, and barely visible it was still there, and Mark was thankful that it meant that no one he knew would question him was in his second period Spanish class. 

He spends the entire rest of the period in uneventful silence, hoping that the headache will go away. Instead, the headache stays and he’s given brief flashes and fragments of the previous night. There was a man at the party. An older guy, probably in his late twenties. Mark remembered how his hair glowed even in the dim light, he remembered hands and whispers and shot, after shot, after shot, after… He vividly remembered that man’s fianceé coming home, a pretty sounding woman, with an innocent voice; remembered the cold pavement on his barefeet, and a scrawled phone number on his palm. The rest, the events, the majority of the night were a blur of color and alcohol induced amnesia. The shrill sound of the bell ripped Mark painfully from his thoughts. Mark knew the hallway would not be a pleasant place. 

* * *

Third and fourth period passed similarly, though Mark hadn’t really remembered anything more than a few vague texts. His headache had subdued, and Mark was able to enter the lunch hall without a splitting pain shooting through him. Some strange and naive optimist in him told Mark that maybe his friends would not bombard him with questions and accusations, that maybe Jimmy would not call Mark a bad friend for ignoring him, that maybe Ashleigh  wouldn’t give him that look that she always gives Jimmy when he comes to school hungover, that maybe Noah would still give him a hug, like he always does. That is, until he actually sits down at the lunch table with the, and immediately gets questioned.

“Dude, literally what the hell?” This is what Mark knew he would realistically get from his best friend, Jimmy, who was the only one who felt close enough to Mark to swear at him like that. “The only time you don’t pick up is the one time anyone is worried about you! Jesus, Mark!” They angry flare of his nose concerned Mark, that was the look reserved for when Jimmy was legitimately mad at someone, never for him; Andy Greenwood, when he talks to Ashleigh, was given this look.

“Yeah, Mark,” this was from Ashleigh, her sweet voice carrying surprisingly well over the din of the cafeteria. “We all tried to text you. Did your phone die?” Ashleigh had to be the nicest cheerleader he knew, and she was deemed worthy by Jimmy, she was the only girl who he’d ever had his eyes on. “Like, honestly,” she throws a hand through her hair, and Mark watches as the kinky curls just bounce back where they were. 

“It wasn’t my phone that died. I’m pretty sure that was me.” Chuckles. Nothing substantial. Maybe it was the tone of Mark’s voice that said not today. Or maybe it was just the general tone of the conversation.

“What happened last night, man?” Jimmy, ever relentless, wasn’t putting up with Mark’s anything. “Did you get that smashed, because, like, if you’re going to go get drunk, I want to come watch,” Mark shrugs, like it’s nothing. He doesn’t reply to Jimmy’s comment but does say,

“Yeah. And I met someone,”  _ A guy, actually. _ He did not say that. Mentioning it probably meant rejection by his friends, something that Mark would never be able to handle. Before he could go on, a fluff of blond hair smashes against his cheek, and he’s all but tackled. Thankfully, years of football and knowing Noah had gotten him used to this. 

“I was _so_ _worried!_ ” Noah’s voice was much too close to Mark’s ear for comfort, despite the fact that the previous year he and Noah had tried (secretly) dating. It ended quickly but amicably, the only things to survive it were their friendship and a strange tolerance of pet names from both of them. The majority of the female population was jealous that Mark could be so affectionate with Noah, despite Noah’s habit of casual affection with everyone.  

“Noh, what the-” Mark is cut off by Ashleigh before he can inquire about Noah’s enthusiasm. 

“Noah, you dork. Can’t you see how hungover Mark is?” Mark could probably the draw the face Noah makes -a coy tongue peeking out from his lips, scrunched nose, mischievous grin- in his sleep. He sometimes wonders if Noah isn’t really his best friend over Jimmy.

“So? I don’t see any of you hugging him!” This is how everything was with Noah; easy affection, casual touches, naturally flirtatious smiles, and the frequent unavoidable hugs. Ashleigh replies, smiling,

“Because we aren’t you. You could probably hug Andy and he wouldn’t flinch away,” a brief pause. “He certainly wouldn’t hug back, though.” At this, Mark could feel Noah beaming against his shoulder. Andy Greenwood. It was easy to forget the shy, taciturn boy who made Mark’s stomach churn. He was the childhood friend of the bright, bubbly Ashleigh, especially since he only came to St. Nathaniel’s the year prior. Apparently he had been at a boarding school in Ireland for a few years; how he managed to remain friends with the flighty Ashleigh never ceased to astound people. She seemed to be the only one who affectionately called him Andy, to his face, at least. The girls would whisper about him in the halls, their tones reverent, suited for the church that they were in, and they always called him Andy.

“You really think so? Maybe I could try. How fun would that be?” Noah’s voice is playful, but Jimmy sneers, and Noah cowers behind Mark. 

“Why would you want to get anywhere near that fa-” a swift smack to the back of his head cuts Jimmy off. It came from Ashleigh, who had turned into the Andy Defense Squad; Ashleigh would never let something so cruel be said about her Andy. 

“Don’t you dare, Jack James. You will not talk about my Andy like that!” Next to her, the bleach blonde Katy mouths every word as Ashleigh says them. This was a common event between the two of them and Mark would never understand how Ashleigh and Jimmy managed to stay together, it wasn’t like they had children to stay together for. A strange calmness settles over the table then, Mark silently watching them eat. On a normal day, Mark was the one who lead the conversation, but with today’s headache and Noah’s respect for how close he was to Mark’s ears, the table sat in a somewhat awkward, somewhat companionable silence, and Mark was left again with his thoughts. 

His memory of the previous night was still hazy, leaving many gaps and plenty dead air. He remembered texting the number, only to discover it was wrong, and that he’d just sent something rather risque to a stranger. He remembered texting that Wrong Number Boy after he sent the picture, though he doesn’t remember why. The conversation, as far as her could  recall, lasted quite a while, longer than most text conversations people have with Mark. He chalks this up to the fact that the acquaintanceship began over text, and therefore could not be dulled by the barrier. 

Noah’s arms were still wrapped around Mark. Maybe people would start more rumors. “You’re pretty quiet today, Mark,” he whispers. No one else noticed that he’d spoken. “Maybe you should go lay down or something.” Noah begins to sway slowly, soothingly; left, right, left, right. Mark really did want to take a nap, that’s one thing he missed from dating Noah. They always took fantastic naps. But Mark shakes his head.

“I can’t miss history, Noh. I’ll get kicked off the team if I fail this project.” History had never been Mark’s best subject, too many dates, names, places, little details. He frequently was just barely scraping by in it. Noah hums. All is quiet again, when suddenly, Katy pipes up with,

“I just remembered! Fosters assigns your project partner for you. Something about choosing the partner that would be most beneficial for your grade or something.” The whole table erupts. All of them, save Katy, had history together, “Yeah, and I hear Greenwood already knows his partner. I’m taking bets, I think it’s Noah.” A sour look crosses Noah’s face. Mark doubted it was the idea of being paired with Andy, and more the common conception that Andy never did any work when paired with someone. No one knew how that rumor began, but it had stuck.

“Put me down for twenty on Jimmy.” He sounded disgruntled by it all. Mark responds with a playful grin. 

“I’m putting forty on you, Noh.” Ashleigh didn’t bet, but her cheerleading friends did, and so did the rest of the football team. They split evenly between Jimmy and Noah. Ashleigh looked at them all, a small smile tugging at the corner of her lips. 

“I don’t bet on either of them.” Her smile only grows when the whole group just stares at her. Someone, Mark thinks it’s Katy’s brother Charles, is brave enough to ask if she knows who it really is. Ashleigh just keeps smiling.


	2. Chapter 2

    When Mark walked into Mr. Fosters’ history classroom, Andy was not sitting where he normally sat. There was no official seating chart in this class, but students rarely moved. Today, Andy was sitting in the seat to Mark’s right, the spot Jimmy would normally take. Unlike every other classroom at St. Nathaniel’s, Mr. Fosters insisted on two-person tables, rather than individual desks, meaning Andy would be sitting close enough to Mark -if he even still sat there today- that he would smell Mark’s cologne, had he been wearing any. After a few moments of watching Andy calmly sit there and read, his haunting eyes shrouded by a curtain of dark hair not quite long enough to hide his proud Welsh nose, Jimmy walks in. Mr. Fosters was not yet there, nor was anyone else, so Jimmy had the courage to say,

    “Hey, fag, you get lost on the way to tea with the queen?” Andy looks up slowly. Mark feels a pool of ice form in his stomach. Andy blinks at them, silent. “You hear me, freak? You retarded or something?” This is why Andy’s eyes swam in Mark’s nightmares, never once had Mark stood up for Andy when Jimmy did this. He just stands and watches it happen, watches as Andy would nearly get the life beaten out of him. No one ever seemed to notice, not now and not when they were little kids; no one ever seemed to notice Andy, not Ashleigh, not the teachers. Maybe Mark was the only one who felt any guilt about tormenting him. Andy had to hate them both. Mark wasn’t sure he’d be able to live with himself if he didn’t. “Move.” Jimmy says, commands. Andy stays where he is. It was such a small act, it would be nothing to anyone else, but Mark can see the terror in Andy’s eyes, even half covered by his hair. Before the situation can escalate, Mr. Fosters enters the room and claps Mark on the back.

    “Alderon, kiddo, I should tell you before class gets started, Greenwood will be your partner on the project.” Fosters said it with a smile, but Mark and Jimmy were obviously tense. Mark could all but feel the waves of fury radiating out from Jimmy, aimed both at Andy and at Mr. Fosters. “Now, I don’t mean to be rude, but you two should probably get to work now before the others show up to distract you.” Mark nods, the ice in his stomach is replaced with a sensationless numb.

    He sits next to Andy who looks at him for a moment, before going back to his book. As the rest of the class trickles in, shocked whispers began. “Why are they sitting together?” “I didn’t even know they were friends.” “Did Jake and Mark have a fight?” “You think they’re history partners?” Mr. Fosters begins the class, ignoring the whispers, and not mentioning Andy or Mark in the list of partners. Not wanting to disturb anyone, Mark gets out a piece of paper and scrawls out a quick message.

  **Dude you really my partner?**

    Andy barely looks at the question, then nods. Just once, just enough to answer the question, but not give any insight into who he was, which is what Mark hoped to discover, at least slightly, by the end of the project. This time, Mark didn’t give him a yes or no.

**Did you volunteer or were you forced?**

    Andy had to answer this properly.

  _Fosters asked if I would be okay with helping another student via becoming history project partners. I said yes._

    It took Mark a moment to process the note, he couldn’t get over Andy’s handwriting. Elegant and swirled, it reminded Mark of what the Declaration of Independence was written in. He really wanted to comment on it, to mention how beautiful it was. He did not.

  **Why’d you even say yes**. **I thought you hated people?**

    Andy didn’t reply. He just kept reading, though somehow Mark knew he’d seen it.

**You some kind of history genius?**

  _Something like that._

    Mark wanted to think there was amusement in this response, but it seemed too forced, too terse to be comedic. Before anything else can be said, Fosters declares it time to work, and the class explodes with chatter. Mark drums his fingers on the table, they were the only pair not talking. How were they supposed to get to work if Andy wouldn’t talk to him?

     “So, uh, are we going to get started?” The question sounded as awkward as it felt, unreal, but Mark was almost painfully nervous. He didn’t know why. He and Andy had never really spoken before. There had been, of course, the occasional ‘hello’ when Andy would come to talk to Ashleigh about one thing or another, but beyond that…

     “Haven’t you said,” the lilting sound of a barely familiar accent draws attention back to Andy and out of his head. “That you enjoyed studying the Punic Wars?” Andy kept his eyes trained on his book, and the question hung between them. It was an invitation, an offer of team work, of acquaintanceship. Mark was surprised both at the offer and the memory.

“Yeah, like, months ago.” Andy nods, then finally closes his book. He still doesn’t look at Mark,  but pushes the book toward him. He looks at it, a little startled. “ _The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire._ Didn’t we read parts of this in class?” Something about this situation seemed strange to Mark, like befriending a stray who was not as wild as you once thought. Andy doesn’t answer the question. The icy guilt was forming in Mark’s stomach again.

“I’ve marked the beginning of the section on the Punic Wars, if you’re interested,” the way Andy sat as he said this made him seem so young, so fearful; he was turned away from Mark, with his hands pushed together between his knees, his head ducked, and his sweater, pulled taut around his shoulders, pooled around around his wrists. It was a self-created cocoon, and it worsened the guilt in Mark.

“Thanks,” a pause as Mark tried to gather the thoughts flying rapidly through his mind around the loud sounds of friends working on this project that he and Andy so quietly discussed. “Don’t get me wrong, Andrew,” a strong flinch jolted Andy’s body, and Mark immediately blurts out an apology. He didn’t know why he apologized, or even what he’d done wrong, but he didn’t want to upset Andy more than he obviously already was. Andy shakes his head.

“Just call me Andy. Please.” Another long silence, a deep void between them that could never be filled. Mark felt the ice melt just a little bit, knowing that he could call him Andy.

“Okay,” he says eventually. “Er, anyway, don’t take this the wrong way, uh, Andy, but do you actually want to do this project on the Punic Wars?” Andy presses his shoulder into his ear and mumbles something. “Sorry, what?” Andy finally, finally looks up, looks at Mark. Those pale eyes cut straight into Mark’s soul, and he was certain Andy wouldn’t like what he saw there.

“I said, I don’t mind.” Andy’s voice was so quiet, that if Mark hadn’t seen his lips move, he would have thought the sound imagined. Ordinarily, if someone told Mark that they ‘didn’t mind,’ he would fight it, make them confess to not really wanting to do the the thing they claimed they didn’t mind, but something in those green eyes was so sincere, so truthful that Mark couldn’t find disbelief of the statement in him.

“Okay,” Andy looks away, at something behind Mark, Ashleigh maybe. Mark hadn’t really noticed until then that many people were watching them closely. He stares back, saying to Andy, “Should I start now, or is there something else?” Andy shakes his head, and goes to his own book. Mark squints at the poor girl who had been caught in his death glare, then turns to the book Andy leant him. As promised, one page was dog eared, and it was the beginning of the discourse on the Punic Wars. The longer he stared, the more Mark was convinced that this book had never before been opened, that it was brand new, that Andy bought it specifically for him. It was a ridiculous thought. “ _Of the fourteen regions or quarters into which Rome was divided, four only subsisted entire, three where level with the ground, and the remaining seven, which had experienced the fury of flames, displayed a melancholy..._ ” Mark realized, the more he read, that he wasn’t comprehending most of it. He tried again. And again. The language was dense and winding, not anything Mark would be able to understand on his own, if only because English was his secondary language.

He knew it was nothing to be ashamed of, neither of his parents spoke English at home if they could help it, and they were rarely speaking the same language. Mark hadn’t really learned to speak or read English until about the second grade, and that was thanks to intensive language classes. To this day he was about two reading grades behind the majority of his peers. He did not want to ask Andy the Genius for something easier to read. He wouldn’t.

He had to.

“Uh, Andy?” Andy merely hums in reply, he doesn’t look up. “Do you have something that’s easier to read?” He barely even glances from his book, and Mark is relieved by it. If Andy had really looked at him, Mark probably would have chickened out.

“Why?” Andy asks this with the same innocent sincerity that he had when he said he didn’t mind doing his project on the Punic Wars. It gave Mark a strange confidence.

    “Well, uh, English isn’t my first language, and it’s still kind of hard for me to read some stuff,” Andy just hums again, and pushes a different book to him. This one had a delicate silk bookmark dangling from its pages. Mark then noticed that the book Andy was reading also had a silk bookmark; maybe he really had gotten a copy of _The Decline and Fall_ specifically for Mark. The thought warmed him. Mark begins reading again, relieved when the language really was easier. The rest of the hour passed in silence between them, and the roar of chatter and laughter for everyone else; the shrill sound of the bell wrenched Mark from the book before him. Ordinarily, he did not like reading, but the story was written so compellingly, so casually, it was as though he was reading a novel. Before he has a chance to hand the book back, Andy is gone, leaving two books - _his_ copy of _The Decline and Fall_ and the one Mark had been reading- and a note that read “Hopefully my annotations will help” in Andy’s elegantly looping script.

    Ashleigh seemed to find this all very amusing. The entire rest of the school day consisted of Mark trying to decipher long winded and meandering paragraphs out of Gibbon and being teased about even having the book. Noah described it as getting affection from a stray, Jimmy said it was too much like Andy hitting on Mark and he thought that was “disgusting, like, there are plenty of queers at this God forsaken school, he shouldn’t be getting in with the straight guys.” Ashleigh said she was impressed that Mark was able to keep his douchebaggery low enough that Andy could even tolerate him, let alone attempt to befriend him. She also said it was cool that Andy let him look at his annotations.

    “ _I_ haven’t even seen them,” she said, walking next to Mark on the way from history to biology. “He’s pretty secretive about them, as if I, of all people, would judge him for putting hearts around August Caesar’s name.” It had been funny at the time, but it was funnier still when Mark flipped through the book and discovered that there actually were hearts around the first instance of Augustus’ name, and around the first instance of Octavius.

    Maybe working with Andy wouldn’t be that bad.

* * *

 

_?Do you think he’s figured it out_

_nah no way hes not that smart_

_.He seems to be much more intelligent than you make him out to be, or at least more humble_

_LOL mark is NEVER humble_

_Hm._

* * *

 

_hey_

_Hello._

_i think my history partner hates me lol_

_That seems unlikely._

_i just read through our chat history_

_Did you see anything interesting?_

_you’re kinda sassy lol_

_?why’d you even keep talking to me_

_I had nothing better to be doing, and you aren’t horrid company._

?lol thanks

Of course.

* * *

 


End file.
